Sunday, August 17, 2014

In 1969, Frederick Jaffe, the Vice-President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, sent a 9-page memo to Bernard Berelson, President of the Population Council, which outlined the various proposals under consideration by the eugenicists of the day. Aside from serving as the VP of Planned Parenthood, Jaffe also worked in a consulting role with other prominent Population Control organizations like the National Center for Health Statistics, the National Institutes of Health, the Commission on Population Growth and the American Future, and the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations.

Consider the opening paragraph of the memo: "This memorandum is responsive to your letter of January 24, seeking
ideas on necessary and useful activities relevant to formation of
population policy, defined as "legislative measures, administrative
programs, and other governmental actions (a) that are designed to alter
population trends... or (b) that actually do alter them."

In other words, Jaffe was one of the primary consultants and brain stormer for the elite 1% establishment conglomerate of Corporate/Non-Profits/Tax-Exempt Foundations who had the ways and means to effect increased Population Control measures on American society.

Forty-five years later, we can see just how effective the Population Control Industrial Complex has been in shaping our present society, when you see just how much of this original brain storming exercise by this award winning eugenicist has come to pass and now accepted as normalized aspects of our Brave New World Order.

The image of the table that made up the last page of this memo gained some notoriety amongst the Pro-Life/Anti-Abortion blogosphere a few years back. In the time before social media, the Jaffe Memo Table went somewhat viral and generated grist for the mill in the ideological Pro-Life/Pro-Abortion dialectic.

According to Winston Smith over at the Ministry of Truth Wikipedia, under the entry for Frederick S. Jaffe:

In recent years a 1969 memo written by Jaffe has been a source of controversy on the Internet. The memo, written to Bernard Berelson, head of the Population Council, included a table that summarized many proposals from various sources regarding population control. This memo has been erroneously cited to accuse Jaffe and Planned Parenthood of supporting such measures as compulsory abortions and sterilizations, which were among the proposals referenced. In fact the table was merely a listing of current proposals, with sources documented, not the policies of Planned Parenthood. The original memo and an article based on it are available online.

This, of course, is a red herring "re-frame" of the real issue. It's another classic example of the collective Borg of PC thought-policing by the commissars at Wiki, telling us what we are supposed to think when confronted with the table of Population Control measures that were "merely a listing of current proposals."

Having seen a passing mention by an anonymous commenter on another blog citing the Jaffe Memo as a reference to the Population Control agenda, I consulted Googliath, but could not find the Jaffe Memo in its entirety posted anywhere as an easily copy-and-pasted text. Only the .jpg or .pdf picture of the table was widely disseminated throughout teh Interwebz...and the only copy of the entire memo that I could find available -- that was not sequestered behind a pay wall site -- was scanned images of the memo stored on Google Drive.

So I downloaded the image files of the original memo in its entirety and began reading to get to the source of this memo and put the "mere listing of current proposals" into their proper context. As I read, I found myself getting into blogger-fisking mode and wanting to do the classic copy-and-paste of excerpts interspersed with my own thoughts. But the Google drive image files had no text that could be copied and pasted, and I don't have any OCR capable software installed on my current desktop, so instead of a typical fisk-job I decided to transcribe it myself.

The memo in it's entirety represents one of the primary eugenicists of his time weighing the pros and cons of various Population Control measures, and compares and contrasts voluntary versus mandatory measures under consideration by the social engineers of that era. These ideas are considered in the context of American society in the 60's, and how such measures would play out amongst different stratus of socio-economic classes of that era. Jaffe essentially points out that the welfare dependent underclass and the middle/upper-middle classes would require different methods to achieve the Population Control goals of the elitists.

Given the clarity of hindsight by those of us opposed to the agenda of the Population Control Industrial Complex, it is easily discerned that the multivariate approach has succeeded beyond these social engineers wildest dreams. In fact, some of it's "mere listings of current proposals" are currently being promulgated today, most notably the promotion of homosexuality, and the infliction of chronic depression via a genetically modified and artificially engineered dietary zeitgeist in conjunction with the proliferation of unnatural lifestyles endemic to our modern rat race.

In this, the year of our lord 2014 AD, with American citizens of the vanishing middle class not reproducing at population replacement levels, while the welfare dependent classes are producing future revenue streams for the industrial incarceration complex and providing further justification for the expansion of the Surveillance-Militarized Police State, it's not a stretch of the imagination to say we now live in the dystopian world imagined by the likes of Frederick Jaffe, Bernard Berelson, Margaret Sanger and the likes of the elitist eugenicists at the Rockefeller Foundation et al.

The Technical Assistance Division of Planned Parenthood-World Population

Center for
Family Planning
Program
Development

545 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10022
(212) 752-2100

March 11, 1969

TO: Bernard Berelson

FROM: Frederick S. Jaffe

RE: Activities Relevant to the Study of Population Policy for the United States

This memorandum is responsive to your letter of January 24, seeking ideas on necessary and useful activities relevant to formation of population policy, defined as "legislative measures, administrative programs, and other governmental actions (a) that are designed to alter population trends... or (b) that actually do alter them." My observations will be limited to the United States and to activities which might shed light on the necessity for, desirability of and in some cases, the potential hazards, of development of an explicit governmental population policy or policies in the United States.

Apart from the abstraction that in the long run, a zero rate of population growth is inevitable, the arguments advanced to justify an explicit U.S. policy now of encouraging a specific universal limit on family size (as distinguished from proposals aimed selectively at welfare recipients and racial groups) center mainly on two propositions:

1) That continued U.S. population growth will inevitably cause a deterioration in the quality of life of this and future generations; this can be described as the ecological position.*

2) That an explicit U.S. policy to encourage or compel smaller family size in the U.S. is necessary to enable our government effectively to encourage or compel developing nations to move in similar directions; this may be termed the international public relations position.

* A variant of this position is that the U.S., with some 6 percent of the world's population already uses more than half of the world's non-renewable natural resources, and that population growth here thus effects not only the quality of American life but the opportunity of the developing countries even to attempt to improve their living standards.

The debate thus far (in government, among conservation organizations, in the demographic field, within Planned Parenthood, etc.) has with only a few notable exceptions (e.g. Coale) virtually ignored current actual U.S. fertility behavior and its implications for public policies in other areas which may influence the realization of fertility preferences, nor with the predictable political consequences of a major effort to adopt and enforce an anti-natalist U.S. population policy. Nor has it viewed population policy as an element -- but only one -- of a larger field of social planning in which the direct and indirect costs and benefits of each element must be weighed against the direct and indirect costs and benefits of all elements in order to produce a coherent social policy.

Realistic public policies intended to influence actual behavior are rarely adopted in the U.S. only for public relations reasons. Proposition 2 above, therefore, is not likely to become the primary basis for a U.S. population policy will ultimately be made on the validity or invalidity of Proposition 1.

Accordingly, at least as regards the United States, I believe that a number of activities must be undertaken as prior and necessary conditions to consideration of whether or not the U.S. should adopt any explicit population policy.

These suggestions are set forth below, more or less in the order required, logically, for prior questions to be answered authoritatively before derivative issues are tackled. The first activities are designed to provide a definitive assessment of the levels of population growth that can be expected from expanding to the maximum current voluntary control mechanisms; these studies would offer an answer to the basic question, "Does the U.S. need an explicit population policy?" If there then will still remain some definable problem of population growth in the U.S. on a best-judgement basis, the second group of studies would attempt to clarify the terms of the discourse over alternative policies by removing the value-laden assumptions which have thus far distorted professional and public thinking. Then, it is proposed that a wide range of public policies in the other areas -- and their underlying theoretical bases -- be examined disinterestedly to determine what impact, if any, they have had on population trends. Finally, the list of potentially effective alternative policies which emerges would be critically assessed in terms of their likely political and social consequences in a stratified society.

I. The Uses and Limits of a Contraceptive Society

The U.S. has achieved near-universal practice of some form of fertility control (including ineffective methods). The argument for a U.S. population policy rests on the expressed preference of U.S. couples for an average ideal family of 3+ children which will result in a rate of growth which is said to be impermissible. (It is important to note that the number wanted is usually less than the number regarded as ideal.) Yet, current fertility experience appears to go in the opposite direction: the annual fertility rate is now about 85 which, if continued, would result in an average completed family size of about 2.6 children; this is being accomplished in spite of present state of technology, ranging from relatively efficient-to-inefficient contraceptive techniques and, for all practical purposes, with no legal abortion backup; current fertility therefore includes a sizeable number of unwanted births and conceptions. (Data from the 1965 National Fertility Study yields a minimum estimate of 850,000 unwanted births annually from 1960-65, or 21 percent of all births.* While overall fertility has declined since 1960-65, it seems highly likely that current fertility includes at least a 15 percent incidence of unwanted births. If this is valid, the "wanted" fertility rate currently is between 70-75, which is replacement level, if it continued.)

There are, of course, excellent reasons for caution in projecting future trends based on current fertility experience: the fertility preferences of American couples are not static and vary in response to conditions which are only dimly known. But the same caveat applies even more strongly to extrapolations from the post-World War II pre-pill period (upon which much of the demand for a U.S. population policy is based): these projections appear to have been rather considerably modified by the availability of improved contraceptive techniques since 1960 and the degree to which these methods contributed to delaying first births and introducing longer intervals between subsequent births. Moreover, the interaction between improved fertility control and fertility preferences are only beginning to be clarified by scholars like Freedman, Westoff and Ryder who have shown that "later equals fewer".**

I imagine that it was data such as these which led Coale last November to state that there seems to be as much reason to believe that the U.S. will shortly worrying about too few births as about too many. ***

Since the U.S. has the resources to make truly efficient contraception truly available to everyone and to complement this with abortion on demand, it could thus provide a test of the uses and limits of voluntary action in solving the population problem.

1) a definitive study of the current number of unwanted births in the United States.

2) A definitive study of the current number of illegal abortions in the United States.

3) From 1 and 2, an assessment of the likely rate of growth following the virtual elimination of unwanted pregnancy in a society in whicheffective contraception is efficiently distributed to all who want it and abortion is available on demand as a backup measure.

4) Delineation of the necessary and sufficient conditions for achieving such a society:

a) public and private resources: funds, professional cadres, priority.

b) efficient contraceptive technologies.

c) distribution systems.

d) legal, political and institutional changes (and the requirements for inducing them).

e) open questions requiring additional research.

5) Assessment of the political, social economic and cultural consequences of the likely rate of growth indicated in 3, or the benefits against which the costs of achieving a truly contraceptive society (as in 4) could be weighed.

The hypothesis underlying these proposals is that the achievement of a society in which effective contraception is efficiently distributed to all, based on present voluntary norms, would either result in a tolerable rate of growth, or go very far toward achieving it. If this hypothesis is basically confirmed, it would negate the need for an explicit U.S> population policy which goes beyond voluntary norms.

II Clarifying the Terms of the Discourse

The present discourse on population policy is loaded with assumptions, biases and judgements about the causes and determinants of fertility behavior, and these assumptions are imbedded (sic) in the very terminology employed. Some of these assumptions go back in the literature for decades and centuries (e.g., Malthus' "population bounty") but have never been subjected to empirical verification. Instead, they have been accepted as conventional wisdom and in turn, tend to impede and distort clarification of the issues involved in assessing alternative policy proposals.

It is proposed, therefore, that certain key terms and assumptions be clarified and subjected to empirical test, to the extent data and research would permit:

1) Are free social services "pro-natalist"?

The idea that provision of free social services has a pre-natalist effect is accepted almost uncritically in the literature and in turn, becomes a major postulate on which alternative proposals are based. Empirical analysis is needed to determine the extent to which this characterization is valid as to outcome (as distinguished from the rhetoric advanced to justify adoption of the particular policy in the first place).

For example, is there any evidence that fertility among comparable classes is higher in countries, states or communities which make the following services available, free, to large numbers of couples than in countries,
states or communities which do not?

These services of course, have positive benefits to society which go beyond fertility (although some may have a subsequent effect on fertility also - and not in the pro-natalist direction). They appear to be characterized as "pronatalist" only because they do not directly penalize child-bearing but there appears to be no evidence that they do indeed encourage fertility, in the United States or elsewhere. In fact, areas and nations providing more free social services appear, on superficial analysis, to have lower fertility, but this may be explained on other grounds (e.e. higher living standards). Nevertheless, the influence or lack of influence of these services on fertility should be established.

2) Economic "incentives" to fertility

A special case of (1) relates to the presumed "incentive" to fertility in such programs as family and children's allowances. These allowances were (and are) legitimated politically as a means of increasing the birth rate, but the only analyses thus far of the actual results yield no support for their presumed pro-natalist effect. Yet, based on the initial justification and the ensuing terminological/ideological set, many proposals are advanced to reduce, eliminate or block family allowances on fertility grounds.

A definitive empirical study is needed of the fertility outcome of family allowance programs, both to inform the forthcoming U.S. debate on restructuring the welfare system and to shed light on the potential usefulness of economic incentives (and thus disincentives) in shaping fertility trends.

A definitive empirical study is also needed of the specific American variant in this area - namely, the frequent allegation that AFDC mothers have more children in order to increase their monthly allotment. This notion is widely held among influential citizens and policy makers and is one of the powerful stimulants behind the demand for a U.S. population policy.

III Assessment of the Impact on Population Trends of Other Public Policies

Considering the theoretical importance which is attached to social and economic factors in shaping population trends, it is remarkable how little attention has been paid to the effects on fertility of public policies in areas affecting basic social and economic structure. Only recently, for example, it has been suggested that differential welfare standards are a factor stimulating migration (with little or no empirical evidence).

It would seem useful, therefore, to seek some assessment of the actual or anticipated effect on population of current policies, such as:

1) Fiscal and Monetary Policy which appears to regard inflation as a concomitant of full employment and thus, to accept relatively high (or at least preventable) unemployment levels as necessary. Yet, more women enter the labor market under conditions of full employment and the relationship between employment of women and lower fertility seems to be well established. An examination is needed of, in effect, the question: How much inflation could or should we risk to achieve lower fertility? (X% risk of inflation - Y% increase in women's employment = Z% reduction in fertility.)

2) Education Policy; At least two aspects seem worth study:

a) The effect on fertility of policies to encourage higher educational levels for everyone (assuming that the alleged "pro-natalist" effect of free education discussed in II can be reconciled with demographic research showing the inverse relationship of education and fertility); and

b) The effect on fertility of current policies and programs regarding the education of women (for example, to prepare them either for motherhood or labor force participation, earlier or later marriage, etc.), and the likely effects of alternative policies.

3) Manpower Policy -- this is closely related to 1 and 2: the extent to which current policies, ranging from training and apprenticeship requirements to transferability of pension plans, encourage or discourage women to work should be examined. A specific aspect of this analysis would be the extent to which public policy facilitates or discourages the employment of young mothers through provision or denial of child care facilities (assuming again a reconciliation program with the alleged "pro-natalist" effects discussed in II).

4) Farm Policy -- The extent to which the governing U.S. farm policy of encouraging the amalgamation of family farms into "agrobusinesses" has contributed to rural-urban migration during the last 20 years should be examined.

5) Welfare Policy -- The extent to which unlivable assistance levels and inadequate medical and social services, coupled with stimatization (sic) of recipients, have contributed to higher fertility should be explored.

6) Housing Policy -- To which extent has the policy of encouraging small home ownership and suburban development encouraged higher fertility levels? What would be the likely effects of alternative special policies?

7) Economic Theory and Policy -- a special case is the area of economic policy because it is widely believed that population growth is indispensable to economic growth. Whether we like it or not, this is probably the controlling idea in the business community and among the economist, and it is highly unlikely that a population policy aimed at lower rates of growth will be adopted until this concept is replaced. Two approaches are suggested:

a) A study tracing the function -- explicit or implicit -- of population growth in the models propounded by economic theorists historically. The aim of the study would be to answer, in theoretical terms, the question: Among the theories of economic growth in advanced countries which control policy and business decison-making (sic) today, is continued population growth an indispensable or dispensable element?

b) Encouragement of work by appropriate economic theorists to develop a substitute for population growth in advanced countries.

The studies outlined above would shed light on the effect on population trends of some existing public policies; identify the interests benefiting from these policies; and hopefully identify some points for intervention to encourage lower fetility (sic) without the adoption of an explicit population policy.

IV Assessment of the Effectiveness of Population Education In Influencing Fertility Preferences

Expansion of educational activities designed to increase awareness of the population problem has been advocated, both in terms of its intrinsic merits and as a part of an overall population policy. Projects should be undertaken to delineate the content, scope and limits of such activities as a guide to programs in the schools and by private groups, and studies should be conducted to test the effectiveness of these programs in actually influencing fertility preferences.

In this area, it seems particularly important to distinguish between education and indoctrination. Whatever may be the merits and effectiveness of truly educational effort, an indoctrination campaign may well have only negligible effects on fertility values, but may provide unintended support in building a public opinion which seeks legalized compulsory fertility control for selected groups (particularly welfare recipients). The adverse political consequences of such a development on the population and family planning fields, nationally and internationally, could be quite serious.

V Assessment of the Political and Social Consequences of Alternative Population Policies in a Stratified Society

The debate in the United States thus far has proceeded with almost no explicit acknowledgement of the fact that the U.S. is an economically and racially stratified society. Yet it is clear that most of the policies proposed as alternatives to family planning cannot be expected to affect all segments of the population equally. The attached table attempts a rough sorting of the principal measures discussed, according to whether their impact would be universal or selective. Clearly policies which are primarily economic in effect -- tax policies, incentives and disincentives -- cannot be expected to have equal influence on the behavior of rich middle-class and low-income families. Other proposals - e.g., compulsory abortion of out-of-wedlock pregnancies -- can be expected to be applied selectively against those out-of-wedlock pregnancies which are visible, and this has racial overtones. Social stratification thus raises sharply the issue, "Who shall decide whose fertility -- and for whose purposes?"

It seems urgent therefore, that the policies which emerge as apparently useful from the work proposed in I-IV above be subjected to critical scrutiny in terms of the realities of a class-and race-stratified society. Such an analysis should establish which policies can be administered universally and which can be expected to have a differential impact on various segments of the population. The political consequences of such differentiation should be examined, in an effort to provide working answers to questions such as these:

1) Is it feasible to expect that society will accept policies which curb fertility universally -- or is it more likely that those who are powerful will favor and adopt policies which affect primarily those who have less power or are powerless? Is such differential treatment politically viable?

2) Is it possible to propose and justify universal fertility control policies without reinforcing and legitimating -- politically, philosophically and ideologically -- the existing body of opinion which, for reasons having little to do with the population problem, already seeks selective compulsory fertility control of welfare recipients and minority groups?

These studies, in my view, would be necessary for a clear answer to the key questions surrounding an explicit population policy in the United States namely:

Do we need one -- and if so, how soon?

Is the anticipated gain worth the likely cost?

Text of the notorious table on page 9 of the memo:

PROPOSED MEASURES TO REDUCE FERTILITY BY UNIVERSALITY OR SELECTIVITY OF IMPACT IN THE U.S.

(CNN) -- Tropical cyclones in the Pacific do not worry some Hawaiian residents because direct hits historically have been so rare on the islands. Hawaii is a small target in a large ocean.

But the state finds itself prepping ahead of what could be a pair of back-to-back smacks from Hurricane Iselle and Tropical Storm Julio. Even if these two storms weaken or don't make landfall -- as is usually the case around Hawaii -- they can still cause damage, including flooding and debris, experts warn.

So I went to the store today to buy some hearthealthywholegrains (which I use to make my own chicken feed; not for human consumption,) and was bemusedly observing the circus of panic shopping going on as folks cleared the shelves of toilet paper, rice, bottled water, ramen noodles and canned food.

I was able to grab my single bag of hearthealthywholegrains and go up to a single cash register designated for purchasing items that could be hand carried from the premise. Anyone with a shopping cart had to stand in a line that wound around the entire premise of the store. I heard folks grumbling that they were in line for over an hour.

There was no one waiting at the hand carry register.

I was in and out in under 10 minutes.

Once again, I rest somewhat easier than most of my fellow Hawaii residents, simply because I've always adhered to the boy scout motto: Be Prepared.

Now it's time to clean the guns, sharpen the blades, oil the chain on the saw, and batten down the hatches.